


Court Jester: Origins

by Tht0neGal666



Series: Junior Rogues [1]
Category: Batman - All Media Types, Batman: The Animated Series, Harley Quinn (Comics), Red Robin (Comics), Robin (Comics)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Dark, Angst, Angst with a Happy Ending, BAMF Harley Quinn, BAMF!Tim Drake, Court of Owls mention, Dark Humor, Gen, Gotham, Janet Drake Scares Me, No Robin AU, Photography, Tim Drake is Harley Quinn's Nephew/Protoge, Young!Tim Drake, ish, rogue protoge AU
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-05-03
Updated: 2019-05-03
Packaged: 2020-02-16 17:46:48
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 5,493
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18696313
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Tht0neGal666/pseuds/Tht0neGal666
Summary: It snowed ash once, and Aunt Harleen caught flakes on the tip of her tongue. Tim giddily followed suit, and started coughing until there were tears teasing his eyes. Aunt Harleen laughed and said he'd get used to it.(The one where Tim is Harley Quinn's Nephew)





	1. Nobody's Fool

**Author's Note:**

  * Inspired by [Till the Stars Come Down](https://archiveofourown.org/works/4417121) by [Tabithian](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Tabithian/pseuds/Tabithian). 
  * Inspired by [His Dream is Her](https://archiveofourown.org/works/858334) by [heartslogos](https://archiveofourown.org/users/heartslogos/pseuds/heartslogos). 



> Hey so don't yell at me but I'm starting another dumb AU. I've got a filler piece for Drake-Luthor-verse, and I'm still figuring out Lil' Tim's angle in Flock Wisely, and Naruto's kind of kidnapping most of my interest at the moment, but here! Have this too! Enjoy~
> 
> (for the second insperation; it's more 'The Joker's Nephew' series as a whole (which is great and you should read it), but I could only tag a work and not a series so I just tagged the first one)

When Tim was growing up, his Mother and Dad couldn't be home much, so mother often asked Aunt Harleen to babysit. Tim recalls sitting on Aunt Harleen's knee late at night, being bounced while she read textbooks aloud to him and ranted about professors and explained psychology to him. She gave him taffy and lollipops and hugs and blew raspberries on his tummy to make him laugh and tickled him senseless to tire him out when he stayed up too late.

She differed from his mother in a million ways. She is bright and loud and warm where his mother is dark and quiet and cool. She throws him up in the air until he thinks he's flying, and he only has vague memories of his mother's ghostly fingers. She tickles him senseless, and loves him in an entirely different way then his mother's possessive obsession. She's exhausting to be around, even if he can't think of a place he'd rather be instead.

Tim sees the similarities more, though. She has the same naturally black hair as his mother, he can tell when she forgets to dye it. The same curious and obsessive nature; the inclination to fixate on things and learn everything there is to know and then some about them. Their refusal to ever let go of their obsessions and fixations. The same uncanny observation skills and calculating ice blue eyes that they use to their every advantage, making sure to see everything, because missing anything could be their downfall. The same inclination to worm their way into and through peoples minds. They both have Gotham in their veins, roots deeper then even the Waynes, and they both have the same knife-sharp smile that cuts their face open when they're actually happy.

Tim can see the similarities between them that others miss, because they're all the things he was either born with or born to acquire. They're family traits.

Aunt Harleen was there for all of his childhood benchmarks. She was there laughing and smiling and teaching and preparing him. Tim Drake's earliest memories are of his Aunt Harleen's laugh.

She sang lullabies about Owls and Lady Gotham and Lime Baths and every other secret Gotham had for the children that listened, in a screechy voice that guaranteed he wouldn't sleep until he heard every word. Then she would thread her fingers through his hair, chattering inane tips on manipulation and deceit that he didn't really understand but recited back to her nonetheless.

As soon as he started to toddle around, she scooped him up every night and brought him into Gotham. They ran across the rotten streets, sticking to walls like shadows, laughing at the night like phantoms. She sat him down in dark alleys where girls and boys looking like them shouldn't be that late at night but girls and boys like them had every right to, and still whispered and sang and taught him to sleep. Ill intentioned men would approach, and Aunt Harleen's gunshot was only one in the symphony of Gotham City. He grew to knew the streets of his city better then the halls of his own manor.

It snowed ash once, and Aunt Harleen caught flakes on the tip of her tongue. Tim giddily followed suit, and started coughing until there were tears teasing his eyes. Aunt Harleen laughed and said he'd get used to it.

When he turned 4, he got a camera in the mailbox as a gift from his father, who couldn't make it home. His mother gifted him a cold hug that he melted into. Aunt Harleen came over with sweets and toys. She got kicked out of the kitchen, and Mother made a proper dinner with all of the food groups, but Aunt Harleen still sneaks him cookies and candy and drags him and Mother to Dairy Queen.

She still takes him out into Gotham every night. He takes his camera with him once a week, but is too scared of breaking it to put it in too much danger. She plays hand games with him until he has spindly and dexterous fingers, and then teaches him to pick pockets and locks.

Tim wasn't afraid of Gotham, didn't think he ever would be. He was cautious of her, wary, sometimes even concerned for her. But never afraid. Gotham was his, was home, all he'd ever known, all he planned to know. Tim saw a shadow move on a rooftop from the shoulder's of Aunt Harleen, and smiles. Gotham took care of her own. He took a picture.

One day Aunt Harleen comes home, whispering excitedly about a man dyed Green and White and Insane in the most fascinating way, spinning theories about who he was and what happened and how his brain could possibly work. His mother discussed it with Aunt Harleen, and it's the only time Tim ever sees Pity on his mother's face.

From then, she keeps Tim up to date on her most recent patient. It starts with rambling theories and an unending excitement to pick the madman apart. She gets a glint in her eye when she talks about the enigma, the same glint Mother gets when talking about Tim or archaeology. She's obsessed with the intrigue of the man. She wants to pick his brain to pieces.

Then, slowly but surely, she changes tone. She goes from ranting about his intriguing brand of screwed in the head to sighing about what could have possibly gotten him to this point. She stops trying to dissect him as a challenge. She wants to put him back together.

She becomes obsessed with the man, not the mystery. She wants to understand him as a person. The thought confuses Tim.

Her change culminates in her telling Tim how the man was a scared little boy that only wanted to make people laugh, one who couldn't tell right from wrong or happy from sad or love from hate. She whispers, fiercely and confidently, that she was going to change that. He believed her. His aunt could do anything if she wanted too, just like his mother could and just like he could. Whether the world liked it or not.

She hatehatehates The Batman. Tim doesn't, he thinks that Batman is actually really cool, but he knows better then to argue over it. Another way Tim's noticed she is like Mother is that neither of them know how to be wrong. It's one of the few things the two of them share that he doesn't.

But, she's still aunt Harleen. She teaches him to throw a punch and get attention and run, All the while singing praise of Gotham. Some things never change.

Then she wheedles him into 'working out' with her. She claims that she spends so much time watching him, complains that she doesn't have time to stay in shape to maintain her figure. Really, it's just an excuse to drag him into learning the crazy gymnastic stunts that she believed were essential. He learns how to cartwheel by the time he's 4 and a half.

They still go into the heart of Gotham every night, and Aunt Harleen is teaching him to art of remaining unnoticed when he wants to be. Three days out of seven, Tim has his Camera. Instead of just shooting them, Aunt Harleen makes a show of beating up the occasional thug trying to sneak up on them. Tim giggles and takes pictures.

Aunt Harleen comes over one night when Mother and Dad are in town, and drags them all to Haley's Circus. She prattles on about her favorite patient going here when he was younger with his dad. Mother says that if she talks about that man in public she'll douse Aunt Harleen in bleach to match her beloved. Aunt Harleen laughs but doesn't bring him up again. Tim smiles at the familiar exchange.

She points the Clowns out and says 'Watch', and laughs loudly at every thing they do, Tim laughing along. They watch the acrobats, Tim giggling every few minutes when Aunt Harleen leans down and whispers 'I can do it better'. More then anything else, he is focused on The Trapeze and The Boy he met earlier.

The Graysons fall. Father is frozen. Aunt Harleen breaks into (sadconfusedamusedscared) giggles. Mother sighs. Tim screams.

After the circus, Tim, all of five years old, demands to learn the trapeze. Aunt Harleen gets a mournful glint in her eyes, one he's never seen there before, but blinks it away with a wink and a 'Anythin' you want, Timmy!'

Two weeks later, while they're walking around Gotham, she sneaks him into a proper gymnastics gym, one with a trapeeze hanging only a few feet above a pool of foam. This isn't something she knows how to teach, but it's something she knows how to do, so she tries anyway.

Tim spends the night with his heart in his throat, swallowing screams before they escape and alert people to their trespassing. He falls over and over again, and every time he sees the Grayson's ghosts plummet besides him. They fade (he gets up and they don't) and he dusts himself off, giggles at whatever Aunt Harleen says in apology or admonishment, and tries again. It's terrifying and wonderful. They go back every week, and Tim improves.

Six nights out of seven, there is a boy walking the streets of Gotham with nothing but a blonde and a camera. No one sees them unless they want to be seen. Tim snags a picture of Batman, and it's one of the only secrets he keeps from Aunt Harleen. She teaches him to climb and flip and dance up the sides of buildings, and Tim learns Gotham from an entirely new angle. Aunt Harleen beams at his astonished grin, illuminated by a neon welcome sign to a strip club.

He's seven, and he can swing back and forth on the trapeze like a monkey swings through the jungle. Aunt Harleen squeals in excitement and pride the first time he hangs on by his legs instead of his hands and the first time he does a flip. Then she sighs and informs him that she has nothing left to teach. She was never really a trapeze artist, and a single flip is about the farthest she ever got. They go once a month to keep themselves fresh, and it feels like dancing. The Grayson's are always present in his mind, but he tries not to dwell on them too much.

One night, Aunt Harleen catches glimpse of the news and starts shaking and sobbing because The Man has escaped and she's worried out of her mind that he'll get hurt. She runs to Arkham, no more then a mile away, with Tim hot on her clicking heels.

Tim hides in the bushes out front with the grace of Gotham, while Aunt Harleen storms into the asylum with the fury of Gotham. Tim peeks out of the bushes and sees a shadow and hears Aunt Harleen's voice sneer 'Batman' in his head. He snaps a picture. He flinches further into the bushes at a manic laugh, and goes unseen.

Aunt Harleen comes back out nearly an hour later, and Tim falls dutifully into quiet steps behind her. He isn't quite sure she even notices him as she starts crying and curses the bat for ruining her Puddin and growls 'textbook narrsasistic hero-complex of a loonie can't take a damn joke'. She stomps her feet on the slick cobblestone that trails out of the gates of Arkham, and Tim squeaks as he scrambles to keep up. Aunt Harleen hears him and turns around with a chilling smile on her face and purrs that she was going to rescue her puddin. She says that she's the only one that understands him and he's the only one that understands her and no one else gets the joke.

Tim frowns and asks 'Not even mother?' , because Mother knew everything, and Aunt Harleen gives a sad chuckle and says 'Janie has no sense of humor'. Tim sniffles and asks 'Not even me?" and Aunt Harleen gives a manic grin and says 'Not Yet'.

Aunt Harleen drops him off at home and makes him promise to be good. She ruffles his hair and says that his Uncle J has heard loads about him and has been waiting months to meets him, and promises to bring the man home for introductions once she 'picks him up' from the asylum. All of eight years old, he swallows protests and nods. There's nothing else he can do. She's obsessed.

The next week, Harley Quinn and The Joker are committed to Arkham Asylum.

Tim hates The Batman.

(Tim hates The Joker more.)

Tim misses Aunt Harleen.


	2. Prove Profits

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> "Very good, Timothy. Very good." She nodded with something like pride and he nodded back. They went their separate ways for the night. She did not wake him to say goodbye when she and Jack left in the morning. Tim refused to shed a tear as he walked into Gotham.

Mother comes home after Aunt Harleen is incarcerated. Dad does too. They have many fights over the woman, Mother never raising her voice and Dad always raising his. Neither of them seem to give a thought to the emotional wreck of Tim, who had been abandoned by the only adult that never left him. The absence of Aunt Harleen at his side left like the loss of a limb. 

He cried every day, loud and wailing and begging to be noticed. He went silent every night, sneaking out onto the streets of Gotham with only the company of his camera. He was a ghost on the streets and the rooftops, nothing but a flash of light and a giggle and hand prints walking across the streets of Gotham, following the trails left by hands larger and more feminine then his own. He tastes Ash on his tongue until he feels like he could spit fire. 

A month after Aunt Harleen's incarceration, Mother pulled him into her study. He sat silently in front of her, posture perfect and any loose emotions reigned in and masked by an innocently curious gaze. His eyes did not snap to the spot where Aunt Harleen would be sitting on the table if she were here. Neither do Mother's.

"Timothy. Your father and I have a dig in Cueva Lucero next week. I believe you are perfectly old enough to care for yourself by now. In fact, I would believe that given the time you've spent with my sister, you would have been fine to stay alone sometime last year, had she no longer wished to watch over you. You're a big boy by now, yes my dear Timothy? Son?" She intoned, black fingers folded together on her desk. Her blue eyes bored into him expectantly. 

He opened his mouth to say no, to beg her to stay, or maybe even beg her to take him with them, but the words caught in his throat as 'son' echoed through his head. She'd never called him that before. He had always been Hers, her blood, her heir, her possession to mold as she pleased. She had never assigned any humanity to him beyond his name. 

It was a test, he realized. A test, and an trade. Agency at the price of Loneliness. Person Hood for the price of Family. He swallowed the pleas before they had any chance to escape, and nodded with confidence. She was right. Aunt Harleen had been preparing him for the reality of Gotham his entire life. He was more then ready to face his city with open arms.

His mother nodded, satisfied, and folded him into his first hug from her since he turned four. It was just as paradoxically cold and easy to melt into as a childish corner of his mind remembered, but he did not. He returned the hug as stiffly as possible, and refrained from chasing the comfort as she rose to her feet and walked out of the room. 

"Very good, Timothy. Very good." She nodded with something like pride and he nodded back. They went their separate ways for the night. She did not wake him to say goodbye when she and Jack left in the morning. Tim refused to shed a tear as he walked into Gotham.

It was different in the day. The streets were familiar, the buildings the same, but everything else was different. The people. The lights. The shadows. The sounds. There were disturbingly less gunshots but just as many screams, and traffic was noisy. The day was very noisy, no one making an effort to keep quiet and try to listen for The Batman. There was less fire to smell but more gas, and just as much cigarette smoke. It was different, but it was still Gotham.

He shook off the slight wrong-footed feeling, smiled, and walked himself to the community recreation center. He marches up to the front desk and requests the schedule. The teen working the counter didn't even look up as she lazily pushed one over to him.

He looks through it, and the wheels in his brain are spinning as they string together a schedule. Gymnastics Monday, Taekwondo Tuesday, Tumbling Wendsday, Tai Chi Thursday, Akido on Friday, Ballet on Saturday, rest on Sunday. Tim smiles just a little sharper then most people would be comfortable with, because it's awfully convenient that Gotham just so happens to offer so many diverse self defense classes. He loves his city.

Tim doesn't know what he's doing, really, when he starts the class. The admission scares him a little bit; he's never done anything without a reason before. But then, he's never done anything without Aunt Harleen before either. 

He gulps, pushes the wrong-footedness back once more, and walks through Gotham. The sky is getting darker, and he relaxes into the familiar shadows. He walks home, Camera shoved under a baggy sweater expertly, thoughts filled with nothing but static.

For what feels like forever he lives like that, going through the motions. Every weekday, he gets up and goes to class. He switches from homeschooling from Aunt Harleen to online schooling by himself, though he uses his mother's name as his 'supervisor'. It's awfully boring, and he finishes his courses quite quickly all things considered. He doesn't have much time to waste on school.

Three days out of seven, he went to the rec center in the heart of Gotham. It had the best self defense classes, all taught by a trio of well meaning ex-convicts and an old cranky war vet, all of which just want street kids to be able to defend themselves. They aren't nice and their classes are brutal, but they're effective. He likes them more then he likes most people.

Another three days out of seven, he went to the rec center closest to Gotham Academy. It had the best gymnastic and dance classes, all taught by a friend group of ex-strippers and ballerinas that somehow usurped the previous uppity Broadway wannabes that had been teaching there before. They were all Gotham, with bloody lips and too many teeth and at least three knives on them even in those skintight suits. They reminded him of Aunt Harleen.

Seven nights out of seven, Tim roams the streets of his city with nothing but his camera, his teachings, and the shadows he fits into like a glove. He only stays out an hour or two, but he'd go crazy without the sightseeing. He takes pictures and puts them in an album to show Aunt Harleen one day.

Exactly nine times, he stays out all night. Those are the nine nights that Aunt Harleen breaks out, and he follows her around like a stray animal, capturing pictures, mouth hurting from his own smile. Three times she is with the Joker, and three times Tim goes home desperately hoping he didn't breathe in any of that horrid Joker Venom. Mother would be unhappy.

Really, it's all rather mundane after a while. He builds muscle and skill. He grows isolated and perhaps a touch mad. He starts to feel so cold that he can't stand living without Aunt Harleen anymore. a voice that sounds like a mix of his mother and his aunt scolds him; "if you can't, then don't.". 

Then, just like that, he's making a plan. He isn't quite like Aunt Harleen, or his mother, not really. He's a mix of the two of them. He's Emotional and Methodical. Passionate and Cold. Dramatic and Quiet. Both of them together, with perhaps a touch more common sense, courtesy of his dad. 

Desperate and lonely and going a little crazy, he puts together a plan. He weighs every step with as much sense as he can, at all of ten years old with highly questionable sanity, and he makes a dozen different vows to himself until they knot together and tie him to his scheme. He's tired of waiting for Aunt Harleen. If she isn't going to come back to him, then he'd go to her.

He wonders if this is his first obsession. His lips curl up like burning paper or wounded animals at the thought.


	3. And The Jester Laughs Now

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> He was a jack of all trades by the end, but still a master of some. He always was an overachiever like that.

Tim could admit, to himself at least, that there was no doubt in his mind that Aunt Harleen could fix The Joker. His mother's family was a special kind of prepackaged obsessed and insane and observant. If she tried hard enough, she could tear him down and build him back up, brick by brick, in only a matter of months. Even if she wanted to just fix him instead of remake him, it couldn't take her more then a decade or two. Aunt Harleen was good at what she did. Tim still believed, wholeheartedly, that Aunt Harleen could fix even The Joker with enough time.

The problem, really, was his impatience. At least, when it came to his Aunt. Patience was another lesson weaved into his cranium before he could speak, but it had never applied to Aunt Harleen. She had always been there whenever he wanted her, even when he always wanted her there. She was never more than a phone call away. He never learned how to wait for her, and now she spent all her time either in Arkham or with The Joker. 

Tim was selfish and possessive with the things he loved. It's what he was taught. It's how he was born. He wouldn't let Aunt Harleen go that easily.

He wrote his plan out as a bulleted list on a sticky note, and burned it once he was confident in his memory.

Step One: Round out his skill set.

(He finished the Rec Centers classes for Tai Chi, Taekwondo, and Akido. Tried boxing for a while. Dabbled in a few more fighting classes, only really stayed for Brazilian Jui Jitsu. He finished Gymnastics and Tumbling. His teachers were all surprisingly-genuinely proud and impressed, when he finished the courses by the time he was 11. He didn't get the big deal. It's not like he had anything better to do.

He went to Circus Art classes after that. Honed his skill on the trapeze. Learned Tightrope Walking and Juggling and Ariel dancing. He found a shifty dive bar, dressed in drag, and took pole dancing classes for a few months. Took on parkour for a summer a year or so back. He cycled between a few dance classes. Did a bit of park-theater. Sulked in the shadows of crime scenes, picked some stuff up from both the criminals and the detectives. First Aid courses. A few other things.

Then he turned 11, and discovered the programming. It was a logical and tedious practice, and Tim loved it. It was like a puzzle, a game, and a math test combined, and he had always loved all of those. He dedicated the entirety of every Sunday, including the night he would typically spend on the street, to holding himself up and falling into the fascinating world of coding. It just made sense, and so few things did these days. 

He was a jack of all trades by the end, but still a master of some. He always was an overachiever like that.)

Step Two: Stalk The Batman. learn everything he can about him. 

(He isn't expecting much, honestly. It was The Batman. In all his years, he had only ever caught a single picture of the man. He was as elusive as they came, and Tim wasn't entirely sure what he expected to get from stalking The Batman.

There's no way he could have predicted what he'd get, though. First, most obviously, it was stellar stealth training. He could hide from The Batman. He doubted many others could claim the same. He wasn't even sure Aunt Harleen could manage. The thought made him giddy and guilty.

Somehow though, more importantly, he gets a lead on who The Batman is. It's just a hunch right now, a collection of coincidences, a man who's an excellent actor but can't hide his familiar eyes, a few tics and body language patterns, and a lucky picture of the BatMobile leaving his next door neighbors mansion, caught from the top of his own estate early one sleepless morning.

He might know who The Batman is, but he does know that he won't be telling anyone anytime soon. If he had to figure out himself, so did they. Maybe, once The Joker wasn't there for Aunt Harleen to blab to, he'd tell her. For now, though, he was content with his endeavor. Added stealth, the foundations of thinking on his feet, and a general feel for what he was getting himself into was more then enough.)

Step Three: Wait for the next time Aunt Harleen breaks out of jail after steps 1 and 2 are finished to satisfaction.

(Finally finally finally, after what was years but felt like days and decades, he's satisfied. He hacked into Arkham three months ago, and read the entirety of both Aunt Harleen and The Joker's highly classified profiles. He had a grand total of 17 clear photos of Batman. 4 of Catwoman, but she's winking at the camera in three of them. He has a small folder of certificates and recommendations from his clubs. He can take care of himself on the streets, even outside of the shadows. He has everything his Mother taught him at his disposal. He has a lead on one of the most well kept secrets in the world. Finally, he can admit he's ready. Whether she liked it or not, he wouldn't be left behind by his aunt again.

He is 13 years old, and he breaks his Aunt out of Arkham because he can't wait any longer. He just can't. 

Tim waits in the bush he hid in years ago, the first time he walked to Arkham Asylum, and his heart stops when he hears the hyena laugh of his Aunt. He steps out, and she is already facing him with her arms thrown wide. It almost seems like she was waiting for him. 

Her grin is manic but her eyes are softened with joy and pride and relief, and his heart flutters in hope. She pounces on him, engulfs him in the biggest bear hug he can imagine. It's the first time someone's touched him with care in so long he can't even remember, and her nails dig into him until he bleeds and bruises. His do the same to her. Neither of them mind. Neither of them even notice.

"Oh, Timmy boy." She sniffles, mushing his face in her hands, and he lets loose a childish giggle. Since when could he still make that noise? "My, I've been beggin' 'em ta let me see ya for years, Timmy. you've made yaself quite the little monster, I see. Whatever has Janie said?" She whispers, a rhetorical question and an inside joke. 

Tim giggles, a smile splitting his face in half. He grabs Aunt Harleen's wrist as tightly as he can, as if she'll just disappear, and he runs them out onto the streets of Gotham. They ran and flipped all the way too Drake mansion, the capes still too caught up with the Arkham Breach to notice Aunt Harleen had even left yet. 

They'd never look for her at Drake Mansion anyway. His mother doesn't legally exist outside of dad, and no one's ever bothered to notice. According to her file, Aunt Harleen is an only child. with no living relatives. It makes Tim smirk.)

Step 4: Convince her to let him join her.

("You sure, Timmy? This is whatcha wanna do?"

"Yes, Aunt Harleen. I'd do anything for you."

"Ya know ya can't be my priority. I love ya more than almost anythin in the world, but, if I gotta, Imma pick Him over you. Ya know that, yeah?" 

"I know, Aunt Harleen. I've made peace with it. I just want to help you. And him too, I suppose, if he means that much to you."

"He does Timmy. He really does."

"Ok, Aunt Harleen. Is that a yes, then?"

"Eh. Sure, why not! Whata we gonna call you then, Sport?"

"...Court Jester? It would certainly fit the theme you two have going here."

"I love it! Court Jester it is then, Timmy boy! On one condition."

"Name it, Aunt Harleen."

"Don' getcha self caught. Janie would have my hide as a coat. Sides, Arkham ain't ready for the likes of you. They can't even hold lil ol me!"

"Yes, Aunt Harleen."

"Hey, that's Harley Quinn to you now!"

"No, it isn't, Aunt Harleen.")

5\. Disappear

(It was a gradual thing. Something he builds up too. First he stops going to school, then he stops going to classes, then he stops going to any places he was a regular at. He finds a recently busted child trafficking ring or Gotham Rogue attack, and quietly add his own name to the losses. No one bothers to look into it. His dad mourns him absently, and his mother somehow sends letters to his safe-house once a month and demands a return on each.

He has several accounts set up that he's been storing money in for years. Between birthday gifts, allowance, college fund, odd jobs he's done himself, the slivers of profit he's been stealing from Drake Industries, the money Janet gives him seemingly on her own whims, and an apology fund that's added to every time his parents can't make it home, he's got plenty of money. He circles through a handful of safe houses, most of which Aunt Harleen knows about.) 

6\. Profit

(For the first time in years, he's content. He spends his days familiarizing himself with the Gotham Underworld (he realizes he should have done so sooner), making friends and enemies and even a frenemy, and gathering all the information he can find. 

He and Columbine got along like an orphanage on fire. He and Stray had a mutual respectful distrust. He and Enigma looked out for each other. He and Mouse were a nightmare when they worked together. He and Firecracker couldn't say it, but they didn't mind one another. He and Crow mostly tried to kill each other. He and Empress made a game of trying to identify the person behind the screen. He avoided Talon like the plague. He and The Siblings taught and traded tips of the trade. He and Bertinelli have a strictly business relationship. He and Anarky were just fucking nuts together. 

Tim wouldn't trade most of them for half of Gotham. Maybe three quarters of it, but no less.

At least once a month, he sneaks or breaks Aunt Harleen out of Gotham for a little while, and they hang out until she can't bear to be apart from her puddin' anymore. Then she turns herself in or lets herself get caught again. It freaks people out, makes them nervous, and Tim giggles at the wink she always throws to the camera.

On rare occasions, The Joker would break out, and Court Jester would watch over him from afar, only barely keeping him alive. The lunatic is lucky he enraptured Aunt Harleen so much.

When Aunt Harleen was in Arkham, Budsie and Louie stayed with him. Catwoman and Poison Ivy were more then relieved to let him take them off of their hands.

His parents die at some point, and Columbine is there with ice-cream, and Mouse is there with a hug, and that's all he really needs. He isn't quite sure his mother's dead, but he's sure that he probably will never hear from or see her again. He's made peace with it.)

There is, of course, the unwritten item to this list as well. The center of his desires, the plan that keeps him up at night, the thing he wants more than anything these days. It's unspoken, it's unwritten, because it's forbidden. It isn't something he's allowed to want. But, Tim can hold a grudge, so he spends hours thinking the forbidden goal anyway.

(The Joker took Aunt Harleen away from Tim for years and, one day, Tim was going to kill him for that.)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hey guys, out of curiosity, who do you think Columbine, Stray, Enigma, Mouse, Firecracker, Crow, Empress, Crow, The Siblings and Talon are/Who they're protoge's to? Bertinelli's kinda obvious, and I'm sure a few of them are equally obvious, but I wanna know what you guys think!
> 
> Preview for the next part:
> 
> Aunt Harleen? A Danger To His Safety? Tim had to resist the urge to burst into laughter at the thought. Then, with a start, he realized he was fighting against Batman, dressed in a ridiculous costume, and maybe could get away with a bit of crazed laughter. He laughed.
> 
> "Quite honestly, Mister Batman sir, Aunt Harleen is probably the safest and stablest person I could possibly be staying with. Well. The Joker's a bit of a problem, I guess, but I'm working on that."


End file.
